Carys' 3rd Birthday AND The Dangers of Efficiency

First - The Price of Efficiency - I have been digital scrapbooking, and my 40gb hard drive was full. So, Greg purchased a huge hard drive and replaced the old one on my computer. Ever since then, I cannot get Shutterfly Studio to work. It cannot find My Pictures on the computer. This has been a constant source of aggravation for me. I LOVED Shutterfly Studio for two reasons: 1) It worked with the way I already had my pictures organized (in folders by year and month and event) rather than insisting on organizing them some other way (as my camera software does). 2) It had a great Screen Saver program. I gave each picture I wanted as part of my screen saver the keyword "screensaver" and the program used only those pictures. I didn't have to use every picture in one folder on the computer. I have been unable to find any other software (especially free software) that would work this way, and I don't have hours to spend learning some new software.

Greg spent hours on the phone two different times with Shutterfly trying to get this to work to no avail. One thing we noticed was that the pictures seemed to be stored in two separate places on my computer, once in My Pictures and again in a My Pictures folder which was in the My Documents folder. Greg thought that might be what was causing the confusion, so he deleted one set of pictures.

Last weekend, I saw that the pictures were still in two places on my computer. What a waste of space! So, being ever organized and efficient, I decided to delete one set. Well, I guess I deleted the wrong set, because it deleted all the pictures from both places on my computer. I lost everything. They weren't in the recycle bin, and they were unrecoverable from the hard drive even though we tried two different programs that were supposed to recover them.

Thankfully, we had backed up the hard drive to an external hard drive on 12/26, and I was able to recover all the pictures previous to that date. I also had whatever pictures I'd uploaded to my blog since then - Carys painting her toenails, Winter Encampment, New Year's Eve. Unfortunately, I had uploaded the pictures from Carys's birthday to the computer, erased them from my camera, but not yet blogged about this event. Therefore, I lost all the pictures from her birthday! Sigh!

Two of my children had taken pictures from her birthday, and there were a few good ones. So, I'm grateful to at least have a record of this auspicious event. I think I need to be less efficient. :) On top of it all, I STILL can't make Shutterfly Studio work or find anything else that works like it did. :(

Carys's 3rd birthday was Saturday, 1/17. The boys were headed to a CAP field trip, so we needed to open her gifts early. The disadvantage to a birthday so close to Christmas is trying to come up with gifts, especially for the 4th child in a family. The advantage of a birthday at this time of year is that you can often hit the Black Friday or after Christmas sales for gifts. That was what we managed to do this year.

Gerren stayed up VERY late Friday night putting this train table together. We got it for an awesome price at Target before Christmas.


I had to use a birthday tablecloth to cover it up!


Carys loved it and has had a blast playing with it ever since.


Carys's other gift was also a pre-Christmas find. She loved it also but can't figure out how to turn the handles. When she needs to turn, she stops, gets off, and picks the Power Wheels up, scooting it where she wants it to go.


After the boys got home from their field trip, we headed to Tampa for Winter Jam. We had dinner at Tia's Tex Mex first. We hadn't been to Winter Jam in several years, since it moved from a big church in Lakeland to the Sun Dome in Tampa. We thought the bigger venue would be less crowded. No way! It was awful. But the music was good anyway. We saw Stephanie Miller, Pure NRG, Francesca Battistelli, New Song, Hawk Nelson, Brandon Heath, and Toby Mac.

Carys is praising the Lord to a New Song worship song!

My New Theme Song

I LOVE this song, and the chorus is SO good that I've made it my new theme song. I'm putting the words to the chorus below the video. You'll have to go forward to about 1:14 for the beginning of the music.



CHORUS:
I've gotta couple dents in my fender
Gotta couple rips in my jeans
Try to fit the pieces together
But perfection is my enemy
And on my own I'm so clumsy
But on Your shoulders I can see
I'm free to be me

Blog Award

I was blessed with this award by my friend Michelle whose blog is lovely and deserving. It's funny. We were first irl friends through our church and homeschool group in Florida, but I feel like I know Michelle much better now (she moved to north GA and we're url friends) through reading her blog. It's one of my favorites. Now, I am to pass this award on to 7 others, and that's a tough one. I peruse many blogs. Some I mainly look at the pictures and skip the writing, but there are others that I get so much from so often that I must read every word! I'm listing these in no particular order.

1) DeEtta - I've known DeEtta through a homeschool email loop for 10 years now! I finally got to meet her in person this past April. Her words both on the loop and on her blog are so often an encouragement and a challenge to me. She shares about her life as the wife of an AF chaplain and the mom of 9 children (3 of whom are grown and living outside their home now). She is REAL! That is the best thing about her.

2) Danielle - Like Michelle, I knew Danielle in real life first, getting to know her through her sister-in-law whose husband has cut our hair for YEARS. Their family became good friends of ours, and I first met Danielle at their house. Then our relationship grew when we volunteered at a church together for awhile. I've gotten to know her better through her blog. She is a relatively new homeschool mom with lots of wisdom from her counseling practice and her life experience. Her blog is always a thoughtful read that makes me think.

3) Dorothy - Dorothy is another friend from my homeschool loop who lives in England. I learn so much from her blog as she lives her life as the mom of a teenage daughter who has high-functioning austism and a teenage son as well. She is another woman who is unafraid to share her struggles with her readers. Her writing is also very witty and usually good for a much-needed laugh.

4) Jodi in NH - Jodi is another friend from the loop, and she is a relaxed homeschooler. She does all sorts of fun projects with her kids, and I read her blog with envy! :) I am not a project person!

5) Kristine - Kristine is another friend from the loop. She and I have similar curriculum tastes, so I often get good ideas from. Kristine lives in rural Virginia and always has her camera with her, so she has beautiful pictures on her blog.

6) Debbie - I have enjoyed reading Debbie's blog this year. She is a mom of 5 adopted kiddos in two sets, one older and one younger. She shares honestly about the challenges of parenting, especially with a husband who is gone for work quite a bit. She is a great homemaker, too, always having a sewing project or a quilt or something like this going.

7) Julie - Julie is a friend from my local homeschool group. I have enjoyed getting to know her in person as well as on her blog. She decided to start a blog after reading mine! I feel like a parent. It is fun to watch her baby growing up.

The Carys Chronicles

We moved bedrooms in our house over the holidays. We took Carys' crib down and moved her into Chase's room. Chase had been waiting impatiently for this day to come. She really wanted Carys to move into her room. Well, it hasn't been working out as well as we hoped. Believe it or not, Carys gets into Chase's stuff! That has bothered Chase more than us. What has bothered us is the fact that Carys does not go to sleep like she used to. Instead she cries, doesn't want to take a nap, doesn't want to go to bed at night without Chase, and gets up out of her bed when she is quiet.

Today I took Chase to choir practice after putting Carys down for a nap. Gerren went with us. I told Landon to sit close to the hallway in the living room, so he could listen for Carys to get up. I don't think he was listening. He finally went in to check on her around 5:00. He immediately tried to call me on my cell phone, but I'd put it on vibrate at the dinner theater Friday night and had forgotten to turn the ringer back on. I didn't hear it vibrate in my purse.

It seems like Carys decided to paint her toenails with Chase's nail polish when she was supposed to be sleeping. Didn't she do a good job?


She was banished to my room to sit in the chair until Daddy got home. Doesn't she look contrite?


Do you think Greg can get a second job working in a nail salon?

Landscaping

After moving into our house six years ago, we finally gave up on ever getting the landscaping finished. This fall, we got our friends Chris and Lisa Winn of Chris Winn Lawn and Landscaping to finish it for us. Jeff also finished the curbing that he and Greg started when they were first opening the curbing business. They all did an amazing job. We really love this little area of the yard. We spent a couple of days at the beginning of the year sitting out there.



We bought this little fountain to sit by the grill area. It gives the appeal of a water feature without the cost of putting a big one in.

4th Annual Meahl Christmas Event

I'm posting this mostly for my "family record" as I don't have many good pictures. This is the 4th year that we did an "event" with Greg's family instead of exchanging gifts. We went to the Sleuth Mystery Dinner Theater in Orlando. Here are some pictures from the "waiting room".

Carys, Gerren, Kay (Greg's brother's wife) and Chase


Rebekah and AJ (Jeff and Kay's kids), Gran (Greg and Jeff's mom), Landon and Jeff (Greg's brother)


Finally, I get in the picture! I think that's everybody except Greg.


We had a great time. The play was hilarious, although it was a little more raunchy than I liked for the kids. I think most of that went over their heads, though.

This has been a really fun thing for us to do. I'm out of ideas, though. Anybody have any good ones for next year?

Word of the Year

Well, I have been putting off this post. I don't like my own posts without pictures. I don't consider myself to be much of a writer. But I wanted to post on my word of the year since I did it last year for the first time. I got this idea from Becky Moews, an e-devotions writer at the Church @ the Springs and a real-life person I really look up to as someone who's ahead of me on the path of life in relation to her children's ages, etc. She has asked God for a word to use each year rather than making a list of New Year's resolutions for four or five years now. Several of my url friends have done this already this year. Some mentioned getting the idea last year from Ali Edwards (I think). I actually have no idea who that is, and I'm not sure she asks God for a word. I think she chooses something she'd like to focus on herself, but I can't swear to this because (as I said) I have no idea who she is! :)

Anyway, last year I felt God telling me to focus on "rest". I didn't a very competent job of it, so God decided to take over. Ha! Isn't that just like him? Last year, I suffered terribly from exhaustion (which I'm finding was due to my thyroid issues), but still I struggled on, refusing to slow down or rest. Then, I began having problems with plantar fasciitis in my left foot (just about 5 months after finally getting over this same thing in my right foot). I simply am unable to stand for very long at this point. This began to slow me down and force me to at least sit down, even if I didn't rest much! Finally, God took us through a situation that made us reconsider our involvement with our church. Well, when you take out the hours of driving back and forth 2-3 times a week (the church is 1 hour from our house) as well as the many hours spent serving in 2-4 services each weekend, you have more time to rest. I NEVER would have chosen to go through the circumstances that I did. In fact, we couldn't believe we were going through something like this again, but God used it to create more time for rest in my life.

This year, I heard a word immediately. Last year, I struggled between two. This year, my word is relationship. In this technology-driven age, I struggle with not letting the computer (bills, lesson plans, digital scrapbooking, as well as url friendships) take the place of actually living life face to face with the people God has blessed me with - first of all my husband, then my children, and then my live-and-in-person friends. I have become more and more aware of this lately, and I believe God was preparing me to focus on this word for 2009.

So, there you have it--my n0t-very-well-written, no-picture post on the word of the year. I can check it off my to-do list!

Winter Encampment

This year both of our boys attended Civil Air Patrol Winter Encampment. Gerren went as a "doolie", and Landon was a flight sargeant. When we arrived for the graduation ceremony, Landon was drilling his flight. I have no idea who this kid is! He really had his doolies motivated.


Our squadron had quite a few staff members. Ashlyn was the flight sargeant for the female flight.


And Sam was flight sargeant of a flight as well. (Of course, they all call each other by their last names, but I am NOT a CAP member!)


I found Gerren in line waiting to complete his final paperwork before the Pass and Review. Right in front of him was another boy from our squadron, Trevor, who was in his flight all week.


Further up the row, I found John Mark, another doolie from our squadron.


Here is a picture of everyone who attended encampment from our squadron, except Shane, a staff member who was busy cleaning up!


Good job, everybody!